Lovers Diary - A Chick Named Hermia

Last week, the lovely Bambola approached me and asked me if I’d do an entry for her Lovers' Diary, much to my surprise and joy.

In her very sweet email to me, she told me that she found my “audacity” refreshing, and her use of that word struck me: I’ve been called ‘blunt’ and ‘honest’, but that was a first.

There’s something severe and rather unpleasant about that word. It's a word is often coupled with ageing dames in black and white movie, screeching at some young harlot-type.

I have visions of Lady Catherine snapping that word at Elizabeth Bennett as she refuses to decline Mr Darcy's offer of marriage: to Lady Catherine, Lizzie is the ultimate gold digger, and her downright defiance of society’s view is what prompts the reaction.

I’ve been thinking about this lately, and when I read that word in Bambola’s email (which I know she means as nothing but praise), it struck an unpleasant chord.

In a world where people are ‘playing the game’, bitching and back-stabbing, being ‘PC’, I find myself wanting –no, needing –to be as acid-tongued as possible to counteract that sickening sweetness of words uttered without thought by self-obsessed wannabe aristocracy.

“Harsh but fair,” is how I’ve been described, but is being harshly honest actually better than sweet lies dripping of a tongue?

I do try, but it’s just not possible to be honest and nice: if you’re trying to be nice, then you’re partially covering the truth, and simply allowing the person you’re confronting to ignore you or argue you down.

While working in my old college paper, I wrote my own column, which was a no-holds-barred look at what was happening on campus. Every time an issue was released, the column was read, my good name was slated by those who were criticised (and by their friends, of course), and sometimes the repercussions were awful. But I shed a few tears and got on with it, acknowledging that even getting people to talk about an unjust issue was an achievement.

I was called a bitch, behind my back of course (people should remember that bitching always gets back to the person it's about). I was nearly unable to attend my final Clubs and Socs awards ceremony. I nearly had one of my grants cancelled. I was threatened with a lawsuit.

By taking a stand, I turned people against me.

I lost some friends.

People admire people who say what they think; society doesn’t. The person who speaks the truth is quite often the loneliest and most isolated person in the crowd.

To me, being nice to a person you don’t like, agreeing with something you don’t believe in, accepting something that’s not right is two-faced and hypocritical: the rest of the world seems to view it as ‘polite’ or as the ‘social niceties’.

The rest of the world is together.

I am on the outskirts, disillusioned and disappointed in mankind.

I have my morals and my pride.

Is it enough?

A Chick Named Hermia x